


You're Never Gonna Fit In Much, Kid

by Sapphy, SapphyWatchesYouSleep (Sapphy)



Series: Peuchen Stiles [2]
Category: Teen Wolf (TV)
Genre: Blood Drinking, F/M, Kanima Jackson Whittemore, M/M, Mental Health Issues, Multi, Pack Dynamics
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2012-11-01
Updated: 2012-12-06
Packaged: 2017-11-17 12:09:06
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 6
Words: 12,533
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/551384
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Sapphy/pseuds/Sapphy, https://archiveofourown.org/users/Sapphy/pseuds/SapphyWatchesYouSleep
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Stiles is a Peuchen, Lydia might be crazy, and Jackson's having black-outs. All par for the course for Beacon Hills.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> This is the sequel to 'Feels Good, Doesn't It' and anyone who followed that will know I have tendency to start writing without having any idea where the fic is going to end. This is a classic example of that.
> 
> Not beta'd, yank-picked, or read by anyone but myself.
> 
> What do you guys think of the title? It's from My Chem's song, Teenagers. It came on while I was posting this and it seemed pretty fitting, but I'm not sure if it's a bit long.
> 
> Updates are likely to be pretty sporadic. Sorry. I've got a dozen fics on the go, and I'll work on whichever catches me eye.

Stiles is still half asleep when he stumbles into the kitchen, his mind fuzzy with half-remembered dreams. His shorts keep falling off, the elastic seems to have snapped, and he’s wearing a t-shirt that isn’t his. He thinks it might be Boyd’s, based on the size and smell, but if it is, he’s no idea how it ended up in his room. It’s nice though, soft and smelling faintly of the pack.

His dad is sitting at the kitchen table in his uniform, clutching a mug of coffee and staring at him.

“Morning,” Stiles mumbles, then looks down at himself, because his dad’s still staring. He can’t see anything wrong, so he shoves two pop-tarts in the toaster and pours himself a cup of coffee. He fed last night, and ate proper food, so he’s happy to have human food for breakfast. It still freaks his dad out when he eats properly in front of him. “Dad, you’re staring. Is everything okay?”

“Sorry,” his dad says, shaking his head and dragging his eyes away from Stiles with an obvious effort. “Sorry, just… it’s still pretty weird, you know?”

Stiles looks down at himself again and suddenly the staring makes sense. He blushes and shifts back to being male. “Sorry dad,” he says. “I didn’t mean to freak you out. I must have shifted in my sleep. I didn’t notice when I woke up.”

His dad shakes his head. “I don’t understand how… Okay, I don’t understand any of this. But I really don’t understand how you could turn into a girl and not even notice.”

The toaster pops, flinging the pop-tarts onto the counter like it couldn’t wait to get them away from itself. Stiles takes them and sits down beside his dad. “It’s just… part of me. Now, at least. To begin with it was really fucking weird. I basically had to learn how to walk again, ‘cos girls have a really different centre of gravity, and their hips are a completely different shape. Now though…” He shrugs. He doesn’t really have the words to explain it. The more he does it, the more he uses his powers, the more normal it feels, to the point where he forgets, sometimes, that other people can’t do what he can.

His dad shakes his head. “I wish you’d told me sooner. I get why you didn’t,” he adds quickly, because he knows Stiles beats himself up over stuff like that, “But I wish you had. I don’t like the thought of you sorting it all out alone.”

Stiles smiles softly, and puts his hand on his dad’s arm. He’s more tactile now, he knows, than he ever was before. Spending time around the pack, he’s coming more and more to rely on touch and body language to communicate. “I wasn’t alone dad. I had my friends. Speaking of which, I’d better get changed or I’m going to be late for the first day of school.”

##############################

It’s actually kinda nice to be back. He knows he won’t think that once he starts getting homework, and yelled at for not doing assignments but for now it’s nice to be here, with his friends, pretending to be a normal teenager.

Not that he’s exactly missed his friends over the holidays. He’s spent the break splitting his time between the were-house and Scott’, getting to know the Betas properly and helping Lydia to test her powers.

He’s grinning when he pushes open the door of homeroom, and it takes a few seconds for the smell to hit him, but when it does he has to run from the room before he’s sick.  
Lydia finds him a few moments later, leaning against a back of lockers, bent over and concentrating hard on breathing steadily and evenly.

“You okay?” she asks. “What the hell was that?”

She moves round so she’s standing in front of her, so that he can see when she reaches for him, has time to warn her if he doesn’t want her to touch. He does though, and she puts a reassuring hand on his shoulder.

“Jackson,” Stiles says. “You..” He laughs a little bitterly. “I was going to ask if you could smell it, but of course you can’t.” He still forgets, sometimes, that he isn’t human any more.

“Smell what?”

“Like… kinda like food when it’s gone off, only not.” Explaining smells is pretty much impossible, as the Wolves are always complaining. “Like, not necessarily a bad smell, objectively speaking, but your body just knows it’s something bad for you, something you should avoid.” She’s staring at him, eyes wide. “I think… I think Jackson’s poisonous.” Which sounds stupid, said out loud, but that doesn’t make it any less true.

She closes her eyes, the look of concentration on her face one Stiles recognises. It’s the one she always wears when she’s focussing on her power.

She pulls a disgusted face. “You can smell it?” Stiles asks, excited.

She shakes her head. “No, but his mind… He’s worried about something, really worried. A little bit panicky. He’s feeling kinda slimy and prickly at the same time. It’s horrible.”

Stiles smiles at her, because apparently putting other people’s thoughts into words is as hard as smells.

“What should we do?” Stiles asks. It’s not like Jackson will just talk to them. He doesn’t understand what’s going on between Lydia and Jackson, but he knows enough to know that it’s not good, and that there’s a lot of bitterness, on both sides, and Jackson basically hates the rest of supers.

“The first thing is to ask the Wolves,” Lydia says firmly. “See what they smell.”

“You don’t trust my nose,” Stiles says, looking mock offended.

“I think they’ll be more objective about it,” she says, “Since they don’t categorise people as either tasty or poisonous.” Stiles wants to object, but what she says is true. Even about the way he classes people’s scents.

“And if they agree that there’s something weird going on?” he asks instead.

“Then we talk to Danny,” she says. And then, to someone behind Stiles who Stiles knows for sure he wouldn’t be able to see if he were to turn around, “Fuck off. Danny’s gay.”

Stiles is really glad that Lydia trusts him enough not to pretend around him anymore, but it’s creepy as hell listening to her having half an argument.

“The voices in your head are kinda bitchy,” he says, for want of anything else to say.

“Voice,” she corrects him absently. “And yeah, he’s a whiny little bitch.”

Stiles images the voice, whoever he is, giving Lydia the finger.

##############################

At lunch Scott, Allison, Lydia, Stiles and the Betas sit together. They attract some attention, but only from people in their year, who know that they never used to like one another.

“Something’s up with Jackson,” Erica says, the minute they sit down.

“Yeah,” Isaac agrees. “He smells weird.”

“I thought he’d just got a new after-shave or something,” Scott says, because Scott isn’t stupid, no matter what people say, but he’s not exactly observant either.

“He smells toxic,” Stiles says. “It’s kinda putting me off my lunch.”

“You weren’t actually planning on eating anything,” Boyd points out. Which, yeah, is true because the cafeteria serves only vegetarian food on Mondays.

He holds up a candy bar he’d got from one of the vending machines earlier. “I was going to eat chocolate,” he says. And he still is. Jackson smells like death, but even that’s not enough to put Stiles off sugar.

“It’s so unfair you don’t get fat,” Erica says, taking his plate and adding his portion of veggie lasagne to her own. When he looks pointedly at her plate, she laughs and says, “Hey, I need the energy. Baby boy kept me up most of the night.”

Isaac blushes and ducks his head, but he’s got that small shy smile that Stiles has learnt he keeps only for Erica. It’s sickeningly adorable.

“No talking about your sex lives in front of the single people,” Lydia says primly, pointing a lasagne laden fork at Stiles. “Especially you. No one wants to hear about that.”

Stiles hold up his hands in surrender. “I didn’t say anything.”

“It’s okay babe,” Erica says, “You can tell me later. You know me and my baby boy always want to know.”

They do too, not that Stiles ever tells them. More like Erica quizzes him and then guesses the answers based on his blushes. Which totally isn’t the same thing.

“Can we stop talking about Stiles’ sex life and get back to Jackson?” Allison asks, plaintively. She’s not a prude, not by a long chalk, but Erica’s a little too much for most people to handle. And Stiles does have a tendency to overshare.

“We all smelt it then?” Boyd asks, looking round the group. Stiles and the Wolves nod.

“He’s worried too,” Lydia says. “He knows something’s wrong, but I’m not sure he knows what it is.”

“Do you think he’ll tell us?” Allison asks, and Scott snorts.

“I think he’ll punch us for even asking,” he says, and Stiles thinks he’s probably right. Not that he’d hit the girls, Jackson’s pretty chivalrous for a total douche-bag, but the rest of them, definitely.

“We’ll talk to Danny,” Lydia says. “Me and Stiles.” Stiles isn’t sure why he’s included in this, he’s always got the impression Danny found him incredibly irritating, for all he was always nice about it. “I think we might have to tell him, or show him rather, the truth. If we want his help.”

“Do we want his help though?” Boyd asks. “It’s not like it’s really our business. If Jackson wants to go round being toxic, that’s his look out.”

“It’s not,” Erica says, “Because Derek bit him. Which probably has something to do with whatever the hell he is now. That makes him the pack’s problem.”

“Hey, I’m not in your pack,” Scott says, because he’s kinda defensive about that. Stiles thinks life would be easier if Scott would just agree to being Derek’s beta, but he’s not going to say anything. It’s Scott’s choice.

“It’s all our problem,” Allison says firmly, “Because last time there were strange supers in town, one them turned Stiles and then my Grandfather tried to kill you. Strange supers are a bad thing.”

It’s a convincing argument.

##############################

Stiles can’t decide whether he should be flattered or upset by how nervous Danny looks when Stiles and Lydia corner him.

It’s after their last class. The rest of the supers have gone to Derek’s, and agreed that, barring unforeseen circumstances, Lydia and Stiles would bring Danny out with them so they could explain things properly.

“Something’s up with Jackson,” Lydia said, crossing her arms and frowning at Danny. She’s standing hip shot and she looks so threatening, Stiles wants to shift to see if he can copy her.

“Yeah,” Danny agrees, but he doesn’t volunteer anything more.

“You don’t know what it is,” Lydia adds, and Danny looks a little bit freaked, which Stiles totally understands - Lydia was scary even before she learnt she was psychic, and the powers have only made her more intimidating - but he nods.

“We don’t know either,” Stiles says. “But we have some ideas.”

“What’s it got to do with you anyway?” Danny asks, not aggressively. He sounds honestly curious.

“Well, if the problem is what we think it is, people are going to blame it on us. And probably try to kill us.”

Danny looks like he thinks Stiles has gone mad.

“We’re not joking,” Lydia says. “Just come with us, okay? Meet the guys, let us explain.”

“How about you explain now.” Danny looks like he’s really wishing he could back away, but they’re got him trapped between them and the wall.

“We can’t,” Stiles says. “Not here. But I swear we’re not going to kill you or maim you or do anything else horrid. Okay?”

Danny doesn’t look convinced, but he nods.

They take the Jeep – Lydia doesn’t like taking her car up into the woods, and they’re meeting the pack at the remains of the Hale house. After considerable discussion, they decided that that was marginally less creepy than the were-house.

They’re all silent on the journey, but Stiles knows Lydia’s voices are plaguing her, ‘cos she fiddles with the radio until she finds a station playing techno music and then turns it up until it’s almost unbearable.

When Stiles glances in the mirror, Danny’s looking like he wants to ask something, but he stays silent.

When they pull up outside the remains of the Hale house, only Derek’s Camaro is there. The werewolves must have run it (Allison complains about Scott carrying here, but she secretly likes it). Derek’s standing on the porch scowling, like the creepiest welcoming party in history.

“I don’t like it,” he says, as soon as they get out of the car.

“You don’t like anything,” Lydia points out. It took her less than a week to start being as tart with Derek as she is with everyone else, despite the red eyes and the growling.

“Isn’t that Miguel?” Danny asks, staring at Derek.

Stiles had genuinely forgotten about that. Now he’s remembered, he feels kinda bad about it. He basically pimped out Derek. “Nah, I have a regrettable lack of hot Spanish cousins,” he tells him. “He’s Derek Hale. I didn’t want you to know, ‘cos he was kinda a murder suspect at the time.” Danny looks suitably alarmed, so Stiles adds, “He didn’t do it. Me and Scott kinda accidentally framed him. Twice. But it’s all good now and he’s mostly stopped slamming me into things.” Except in a sex-related way of course, but Stiles totally doesn’t object to that.

Danny doesn’t look reassured.

Lydia pats him on the arm. “I felt like that the first time as well,” she says. “He’s really not that bad.”

Derek growls.

Allison and the Wolves are sprawled out in the room they use as a living room. There’s a sofa which Stiles suspects Boyd of having stolen from a dump, plus various cushions and beanbags the rest of them have added over the summer. Danny gets glared into a seat in the middle of the sofa, between Allison and Isaac. Which is actually kinda a good call, Stiles thinks, putting him between their token human and the cuddliest of the werewolves.

When he’s sitting there’s an awkward moment while everyone waits for everyone else to explain. In the end it’s Scott who starts.

“You know how Jackson thought I was on steroids,” he says, and Danny nodds because yeah, the whole fucking school knew, Jackson hadn’t shut up about it for days. “Well he was kinda right. Not about me being of drugs. Just about me being… different now. I’m a werewolf.”

When Danny gapes, Erica says, “He’s making himself sound way more special than he is. Most of us are werewolves.”

Danny looks like he’s waiting for the punchline. Derek sighs long sufferingly and shifts, just enough for his eyes to glow and his claws to come out. Stiles shifts uncomfortably and wishes the rest of the pack couldn’t smell arousal because Derek’s Alpha eyes are a stupid thing to have a kink for, but he kinda does.

Erica grins at him (like the she didn’t already know about that) and says, “Derek, I think you’ve programmed some kind of Pavlovian response into Stiles.”

“Can we talk about something other than my sex-life, please?” Stiles demands. “There’re more important issues here.”

“Like the fact that you’re all werewolves,” Danny says faintly, still staring at Derek.

“We’re not all werewolves.” Lydia sounds affronted. “Stiles is a Peuchen and I’m a psychic. And Allison is our token powerless human.”

The pack laugh. It’s a long-running joke. Allison might not be a super, but she still beats pretty much all of them when they train.

Danny looks confused and shocked for all of about twenty seconds. Then he sits up straight. “What does this have to do with Jackson?” he demands. Stiles has always been impressed by how unshakable Danny is.

“He asked me for the bite,” Derek says. “I gave it to him.”

“So Jackson’s a werewolf.”

Stiles shakes his head. “Definitely not. I know what werewolf smells like, we all do, and Jackson isn’t it. We don’t know what he is. That’s why you’re here. We thought he was more likely to tell you than us, and we need to know because rogue supers wandering round town is never a good thing.”

“Supers?”

“Supernatural beings,” Lydia explains.

“Like werewolves,” Danny says faintly.

“Is it just me, or are you feeling kinda side-lined?” Stiles asks Lydia. “Just cos the werewolves outnumber the Peuchen and psychics…”

“Not important Stiles,” Derek growls, though Stiles thinks he sounds kinda fond.

“What’s important is that Jackson’s not human any more, and he’s freaking out about it,” Lydia says firmly. “We need you to find out what’s going on, and persuade him that we can help.”

“Can you?” Danny asks. He’s looking seriously round the pack, trying to read their intentions.

“I don’t know,” Derek says, honestly. “But we’re more likely to be able to help him than anyone else around here. We don’t want to hurt him.”

“Definitely not,” Stiles says cheerfully. “He smells like death.”


	2. Chapter 2

He’s doing his best to hide it, but Stiles can see that Danny is very quietly freaking the hell out.

“Come back to mine,” he says to him. “I’ll answer any questions you’ve got. I know the pack en-masse can be a bit much.”

It’s proof of how shaken Danny is that he doesn’t even try and claim to be fine. He just nods.

Derek corners Stiles on his way out of the house.

“I know,” Stiles says, before Derek can open his mouth. “You don’t like it, you don’t trust him, his knowing puts him and us in danger. Don’t worry about it.” He lays a gentle hand on Derek’s shoulder. “I won’t let anyone take your pack from you. You won’t let them. You’re an adult now. An Alpha. You can protect them.”

Derek growls low in his throat, the way he always does when anyone acknowledges his past, and buries his head in Stiles shoulder for a moment, inhaling Stiles’ scent and leaving his own. Stiles smiles and rubs a comforting hand down Derek’s back.

After a moment Derek has himself back under control.

“If he threatens the pack, I’ll kill him,” he says, and only Stiles and the Betas would be able to hear the slight tremor in his voice.

“If he threatens the pack, _I’ll_ kill him,” Stiles says.

Derek stands on the porch and watches them leave, and Stiles’ heart lurches a little at the level of trust he’s showing, letting Stiles tell this strange human all the secrets of his pack.

##############################

They drop Lydia back at the school on their way home. It’s after six when they get back to Stiles’ house, so he invites Danny to stay for supper.

His dad is home and cooking when they get in. It smells delicious.

“Hey,” Stiles calls as he toes of his shoes in the hallway. “I brought Danny back for supper. Is that okay?”

His dad appears in the doorway, holding a wooden spoon. “Of course. Is stroganoff okay, Danny?”

Danny says it is and his dad smiles. “It’ll be ready in about half an hour,” he says. “Oh Stiles, there’s a load of clean laundry for you in your room. Actually put it away this time, yeah? There’s no point washing it if you then just throw it on the floor.”

Stiles’ heart clenches at the casual domesticity of it all. There’s been a time, a long time, when he worried that he’d never have this again. That things between him and his dad would be fraught and uncomfortable for the rest of their lives. “Yes sir.”

His dad grins. “Not sure it’s all yours, but anything that isn’t mine I’ve put with your stuff. You need to tell your friends that this isn’t a Laundromat.”

“Obviously,” Stiles says with a grin. “If it was, we’d be charging them for washing their stuff.”

It’s happening more and more, that the pack’s clothes get mixed in with his after training sessions. Stiles rather likes it. It suggests a closeness that he’s only ever shared with Scott before. (And he maybe deliberately takes Isaac’s clothes and mixes them in, because neither the were-house nor the Hale house have a washing machine and he knows Isaac can’t afford to wash everything at a Laundromat.)

When they’re in his room he flops down on the bed and says, “Okay, shoot.”

“What are you?” Danny asks, sitting at the desk.

“Peuchen,” Stiles says. “Don’t bother Googling it, you won’t anything worth reading. We’re a pretty well-kept secret. Probably because we’re shape-shifters.”

“Like werewolves.”

Stiles shakes his head. “The Wolves can shift between human and were-wolf shapes, but not into anything else. Peuchen can, in theory at least, shift to look like anything we want.”

He concentrates hard and knows from Danny’s gasp that it’s working – that his hair is now red. “That took me three months to learn,” he admits. “Shifting really isn’t easy. The other defining thing about Peuchen is that we live on a diet of blood and raw meat. Werewolf blood,” he adds quickly, when Danny starts to look scared. “They can loose a lot more than a human without it harming them.”

“Does your dad know?” Danny asks, with a kind of fascinated horror.

Stiles nods. “Going to hospital if you’re not human is a really bad idea. I did try to tell Derek I was fine, the bullet wound didn’t even scar, but he insisted. Blood tests on a Peuchen turn up some very… interesting results. I had to either tell dad, or let him think I was on drugs.”

“Awkward,” Danny says, far more calmly than Stiles feels he has any right to be.

“You have no idea,” he says. Turning into a girl in front of his dad for the first time had been a horrible combination of nerve-wracking and shameful. It was okay now – he tried to stay male around him, but his dad was getting used to seeing his only son dressed in women’s clothes. He’d even stopped questioning when he found panties or bras around the house.

“So Derek bit Jackson?” Danny wanted to know.

Stiles nods. “I didn’t know about that till recently. Derek’s kinda new to the whole Alpha thing, he doesn’t like to talk about things. But I know he’s been worried. By now, Jackson should either be a werewolf or dead. Or he might be immune, but the odds of him and Lydia both having that immunity are ridiculously small. Not even a million to one chance. But apparently something’s gone wrong.”

“What… what could go wrong?”

Stiles shrugs. “We don’t really know. I mean, we’re the only supers around here, and most of us were human until a year or so ago. Derek’s the only one of us who grew up with this stuff, and he lost his pack when he was a teenager. We’re kinda flying blind here. But we want to help. And it’s us or the hunters, so…”

“Hunters?”

“Werewolf hunters. That’s what the Argents are. There’s… been some trouble, with them. Hunters are not nice people. Chris is okay though, and Allison’s stuck by Scott even when she found out what he is. I think when Scott finally stops being so damn stubborn and joins Derek’s pack, she’ll join with him.”

“But she’s human.”

“A pack isn’t made up of just werewolves. They usually have a few humans. And even other species.” He doesn’t mention that Derek occasionally refers to Stiles as being pack, and it makes Stiles happier than he feels he has any right to be.

“And Jackson…?”

“He was the first one Derek turned. And he might be a prick, but he also asked for the bite. That means that Derek feels responsible. He wants Jackson to join his pack, whatever he turns out to be.”

Danny slumps. “You really think he’s not human anymore?” he asks in a small voice.

“Sorry,” Stiles says, wishing he could be more reassuring. “I know what human smells like, and Jackson isn’t it.”

##############################

Stiles fills Danny in on the things that have happened to them in the last year (carefully down-playing the danger, because Danny’s worried enough about his best friend as it is, without knowing that psychopathic humans had shot Stiles without even knowing that he could heal from it). His worry is obvious, but he handles the new knowledge with typical Danny calm.

When his dad calls them for dinner, Stiles offers to drive him home instead. He can’t imagine Danny wants to be there. Danny just smiles and goes to help the Sherriff set the table.

When Stiles comes into the dining room (and he honestly can’t remember the last time they ate in there) there’s two plates of Stroganoff and one of raw beef on the table.

“Dad…” he begins.

“It’s okay,” his dad says firmly. “Danny told me he knows what you are.”

“Doesn’t mean either of you want to watch me eat,” Stiles points out. He knows it’s stupid, but he still feels ashamed of what he is sometimes. When he’s curled up with Derek on the mattress he calls a bed, lapping blood from one of a dozen slowly healing bite marks, he loves being a Peuchen. But when his dad won’t look at him because Stiles has gore on his chin, he hates it.

“Son, it’s not like this is a phase. You’re not going to suddenly change your mind and become a vegetarian, so I’m gonna have to get used to it.” When he still looks worried his dad adds, “The emphasis here shouldn’t be on you to pretend to be normal, it’s on me to accept you for what you are,” and Stiles can’t help but grin, because his dad’s quoting from one of Stiles’ rants on the media perception of gender-queer people.

“No reason why Danny has to put up with it though,” Stiles points out, because he and Danny have been getting along today, and it’s been nice. He doesn’t want to scare him away.

Danny grins. “My Aunt breeds prize winning sled-dogs,” he says. “Compared to helping her butcher deer for them, watching you eat raw meat really isn’t going to be that gruesome.”

He gives in, because he’s hungry, and he likes the idea of his friends and family accepting him for what he is now. Of not having to pretend.

He takes a seat and eyes his dad’s plate. “Stroganoff isn’t exactly the most healthy of dinners,” he points out with a frown.

“Stiles thinks I’m going to have a heart attack before I reach fifty,” the Sherriff tells Danny with a smile.

“He’ll be fine,” Danny says to Stiles. “I’m sure your dad’s very fit.” Then he blushes to his roots when he realises what he just said.

Stiles sniggers at Danny’s discomfort and looks over at his dad, who apparently hasn’t noticed.

Stiles skewers a strip of beef on his fork and pops it into his mouth. It’s a little tough, and nothing like as tasty as human flesh (which has become his benchmark of deliciousness) but overall it’s not bad. He eats two more pieces in quick succession.

“You seem hungry,” his dad says around a mouthful of Stroganoff. “Have you been eating enough?”

Stiles fights the blush that’s threatening to heat his face, because his dad doesn’t know that Derek is doing more than helping out a friend, and says, “I fed yesterday dad. The pack give me all the blood I need.” And by pack he means the Alpha, because Derek really really doesn’t like Stiles drinking other people’s blood. The one time over the summer when Derek was injured and Stiles insisted drinking from Erica until he was healed, Derek had broken Stiles’ arm in retaliation. Then insisted that they shouldn’t have sex until they were both healed. Derek has issues.

Danny leaves after dinner. He’s quiet, but he pulls Stiles into a quick hug on his way out, so Stiles figures he’s just thinking stuff over.


	3. Chapter 3

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is kinda short, but that's where it wanted to end, so I let it. Welcome to Jackson's issues, up close and personal.

Jackson stares at his face in the bathroom mirror. There are dark circles under his eyes and his face is gaunt with pain and worry. His parents are worried about him, and looking at his reflection, he can see why. He wishes he could tell them that he loves them, that it will be okay, but the words will never come.

He doesn’t know what’s happening to him, and he’s scared half out of his mind.

Twice now he’s had blackouts – it felt like he’s barely blinked, but when he opened his eyes he was somewhere else, minutes has passed. He wishes there was someone he could tell.

His dreams are changing – he’s always had dull dream, rehashings of things he’s done during the day, interspersed with nightmares that left him sweating and awake and too scared even too scream. Now, in his dreams, he’s a hero, a vigilante, punishing wrong-doers. He wakes up convinced he still has other people’s blood under his fingernails.

He dreams of flying, not that he’s floating high above everything, which isn’t a dream he’s ever had but which he knows lots of other people have, but that he’s really flying, his muscles straining as huge leathery wings bare him aloft. He keeps catching himself rubbing his back, fingers expecting to find wings that aren’t there.

He’s started avoiding sleep, sitting up late redoing essays that are already perfect in a desperate bid to keep the dreams at bay.

Exhaustion is killing his appetite, leaving him shaken and drained, too tired even too get angry about things.

He’s started skipping lacross, and when he tried to go to swim practise, he’d had his first ever panic attack. He’d passed out from lack of oxygen and come too in the nurse's office.

Danny had come barrelling through the door a moment later, worry making him clumsy. He’d demanded to know that was going on and for one heart-stopping moment, Jackson had actually considered telling him. Had imagined Danny pulling him into a tight embrace, telling him that everything would be okay. But the moment had passed and Jackson had lied, had said he was fine, and shaken off the comforting hand Danny laid on his arm with an unkind comment about Danny’s sexuality. (He didn’t care that Danny was gay, of course he didn’t, but it made a useful diversionary tactic, helped stop him from getting too close. They were already closer than Jackson felt comfortable with, but he couldn’t make himself force him to back off. He needed his friendship too much.)

Lydia had told him once, when they were still together, that she worried she was mad. That sometimes she heard thing in her head, things she knew couldn’t be real. He’d laughed at her, been cruel about it, and he’s regretting it now. If it felt anything like what he’s experiencing, she must have been terrified.

His head hurts.

He wishes Lydia were here, wishes she knew. She’d know what to do. She pretends she isn’t clever, because the other children (Jackson included) had pulled her hair and called her a nerd, back when they were still in grade school. He’s always known though, has never forgotten, and back when they were a couple he’d relied on her intelligence. Lydia always knows what to do.

His parents are downstairs, eating dinner in front of the TV. He’s told them he’d not hungry but he knows his dad will have set some dinner aside for him, in the hope that he changes his mind. It would be so easy to go down. Go and… What? That’s what always stops him. What would he say? Hey mom, I asked a werewolf to bite me so that I could do better at lacross and now I’m having blackouts and I don’t want to sleep because my dreams frighten me. Yeah, not going to happen.

Everything would be better if he could just stop the pounding in his skull.

He wonders if this is some kind of punishment. If he wasn’t good enough to be a werewolf. If Scott fucking McCall gets super speed and a hot girlfriend and Jackson gets to slump on the floor of his bathroom with his hands pressed against his eyes in the hope that it will stop the pain.

There are bursts of light behind his eyelids, little flashes of red and yellow, and even though they’re not real, they’re too bright. They make the pain worse.

Jackson opens his eyes. He’s not in the bathroom, he’s sure. He’s sitting on something soft, not the hard tile of the bathroom floor. His head hurts.

Someone’s talking to him.

It takes a great deal of energy to turn his head, too seek out the source of the voice. It’s Danny.

Jackson’s so relieved, because he’s in pain and he’s scared but he’s in Danny’s room, with his best friend, so at least he’s safe, that he wraps his arms around Danny’s neck and pulls him close, holding on tightly. If he just holds on, everything will stop spinning. If he just holds on, everything will make sense.

Danny’s petting his hair. He has a vague feeling that he shouldn’t be letting him, that it’s a bad thing, but it’s soothing and it makes him a little less scared so he just leans into it slightly, tightening his grip on his friend.

When Danny pulls away he hisses. He didn’t mean too, the noise is pure instinct, because Danny’s trying to leave him and that must never happen.

“Jackson?” There’s a question in his voice, but Jackson’s in too much pain to try and figure out what it is. He pushed his head against Danny’s hand and it starts moving again, fingers smoothing through his hair, warm and comforting.

“You’re going to kill me for this when you’re feeling better,” Danny says, which makes no sense because this is _nice_. This is what he needs.  
He thinks he should probably say so.

“’M not,” he says, his voice raw like he’s maybe been screaming, but he doesn’t think he has. “Promise.”

Danny snorts out laughter. “You’re not gonna get me to fall for that dude. You’ve been using that on me since we were kids.”

Jackson hisses again, because he wouldn’t lie to Danny. Danny is special. Important.

“You’re my friend,” he insists, needing Danny to understand.

“Yeah,” Danny says, the hand in his hair stilling. “Yeah I am.”

He sits up and Jackson stops himself from making a sound when Danny’s hand leaves his hair, because he thinks Danny doesn’t like it when he hisses at him.

Danny stretches and lets out a small groan, unmistakably pain.

“Who hurt you?!” Jackson demands, rage at the idea of Danny in pain over-riding even the pain in his own skull. If anyone hurt Danny, Jackson’s going to gut them.

His emotions must show on his face, because Danny takes his hands, forces him to be still. “It’s fine,” he says, his voice soft. “I’m fine. No one hurt me. I just took one too many hits at practise. I’m just a bit sore. It’s fine.”

He doesn’t like Danny being hurt, but Danny says it’s okay, so he accepts it. His head is pounding too much to do any really thinking. He’ll just do what Danny wants.

He rubs their joined hands against his forehead irritably. “Hurts,” he says, his voice a whine.

“I know,” Danny says, not letting him go. “I know Jackson, but we’ll figure it out. It’ll be okay.”

Just for a second, Jackson believes him. Then he remembers who he is.


	4. Chapter 4

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Posted in a hurry and not beta'd. Sorry.

There’re four cars parked outside the Hale house when Danny arrives. He recognises Derek’s and Allison’s, and everyone in Beacon Hills knows Stiles’ Jeep. He figures the other one must belong to Erica. He remembers her saying that her dad had brought her a car; now being a werewolf has cured her Epilepsy, she’s finally got her licence.

Stiles is in the remains of the kitchen when he looks in, leaning against the counter drinking coffee.

“Hey,” Danny greets him. “Where’s everyone?”

Stiles grins. “Still out in the woods, playing hide and seek.”

“Hide and Seek?” Danny can’t imagine Derek Hale playing children’s games.

“Supernatural hide and seek,” Stiles says. “It’s kinda a tracking exercise.”

That makes sense, Danny supposes. “You not playing?”

“I was, but I got found. It’s Lydia against Derek and they both always find me really quickly. The ADHD makes it easy for Lydia to find me and Derek’s kinda… tuned into my scent. Plus I apparently smell of blood and raw meat, which werewolves are good at tracking.”

Danny is never going to get used to people saying stuff like that, like werewolves and drinking blood is normal. Speaking of normal…

“Stiles, did you know… um… you’re wearing girl’s clothes.”

Stiles looks down at himself like he genuinely hadn’t known, then he shrugs. “They were clean,” he says.

“And you had girl’s clothes because…” Danny’s pretty sure Stiles is with Derek, but he doesn’t know for sure. Him and Lydia have been pretty friendly recently.

“Peuchen don’t fit into traditional human linear gender roles,” Stiles says firmly, then adds, “To be honest, humans don’t fit into traditional human linear gender roles either, so I’m not sure why people keep using them. This idea that I’m male, so I can only wear male clothes, that’s stupid. They’re just clothes. And not even all that different from guys clothes. It’s just jeans and a t-shirt.”

The door creaks open and Erica comes in. She’s dressed far more casually than usual, a baggy sweatshirt over skinny jeans, and her hair is looped back into a rough bun, unstraightened. Danny thinks she looks rather nice. Relaxed in a way she usually isn’t.

“Oh God,” she says. “You got him started on perceptions of gender. I hope you’re prepared to be lectured for the next two hours, ‘cos we’ve never managed to get him to shut up about it once he starts.”

Stiles sticks his tongue out at her and she grins. “Who’s winning?” Stiles asks, pulling a mug from a battered cupboard and filling it with coffee. He holds up the pot with an enquiring glance at Danny, and Danny nods. Stiles finds another mug and fills that too.

“It’s neck and neck at the moment,” Erica says, taking the mug Stiles proffers her and pressing a brief kiss to his forehead. The gesture is almost absent, and totally innocent, and Danny feels suddenly uncomfortable. He doesn’t belong here, with these people who’re so close. He takes the coffee though, leaning against the wall and trying not to look like he wants to be elsewhere. “Lydia’s going to win.”

“Allison?” Stiles asks. Erica nods.

“She gets special ‘avoiding werewolves’ training from her dad,” Stiles explains to him. “It’s really difficult to track her by scent, which gives Lydia a major advantage, since she’s tracking Allison’s mind, not her smell. It is possible to shield against psychics, apparently, but Deaton just keeps saying he’ll teach us later.”

“I was doing pretty well,” Erica says, “until I saw Isaac. If you’re thinking about something you care about, it makes your thoughts louder or something,” she adds to Danny.

“Awww,” Stiles teases. “You looove him.”

Erica just grins. “Better believe it babe.”

Stiles pouts. “And here was me thinking we had something really special.”

Erica giggles, a light free sound. It strikes Danny how poised Erica normally is, how tense. “You do have very nice tits,” she says with a grin, “But my heart belongs to my baby boy. Besides, Derek would gut me if he thought I was actually going to make a move.”

Stiles looks suddenly worried. “Has he stopped hurting you for flirting with me?” he asks. Erica nods.

“Whatever you said to him, or did to him…” Stiles blushes. “It definitely worked. He didn’t even yell when he found out I was wearing your panties.”

This conversation is getting very weird, very fast. “The white ones with the blue bows?” Stiles wants to know. Erica nods. “I wondered where those had gone! Must have got mixed in with your stuff in the wash.”

Erica leers. “You’re assuming they were clean when I put them on.”

Stiles laughs and punches her, very gently, in the arm. “You’re disgusting.”

“You love me really,” she retorts and Stiles smiles at her, wide and happy and full of affection.

“You know it, Catwoman,” he says, and presses a quick kiss to her cheek.

“Why are we molesting Erica?” Boyd’s voice asks from the door, and Scott adds, “For God’s sake guys, put it away!”

“You’re just jealous of our epic love affair,” Stiles says.

“Eyes across a crowded locker room,” Erica adds, and the two of them burst out laughing.

“Don’t worry,” Scott says, coming to stand beside Danny while Boyd helps himself to coffee. “They’re always like this. You get used to it.”

Danny shakes his head. “It’s fine,” he says. “It’s nice that they’re so happy.”

Scott nods. “They’ve neither of them had enough good stuff in their lives,” he says quietly.

Danny remembers Stiles coming back after a month off school, eyes red with crying, staunchly ignoring the whispers. He remembers people talking about how Erica had had a fit in class, laughing about it behind her back. Then he thinks of the others, Lydia pretending so hard that Jackson hadn’t broken her heart, Isaac coming to school with black-eyes and bruised ribs, Boyd eating lunch alone every day.

“I don’t think any of you have,” he says honestly. “The pack is good for you guys.”

“I’m not part of Derek’s pack,” Scott says, but it sounds more like a token protest than something he feels strongly about. “But yeah. I know what you mean. I wanted a cure, at first, but now… I don’t miss being human. I don’t think any of us does.”

Watching Stiles steal Boyd’s coffee and duck away, laughing, as the werewolf tries to take it back, watching Erica lean against the counter and shout encouragement, watching Isaac stand silently in the doorway watching them, the expression on his face unmistakeably love, Danny nods. He can understand that.

 

***********************************************

 

When Lydia comes in fifteen minutes later, she’s windswept and smiling. Stiles feels his heart give a little lurch at the sight of her happiness, and then a bigger one when Derek appears behind her, that tiny twist to his lips that means he’s proud of his pack. From the outside Derek looks like the world’s least sympathetic Alpha, but once you get to know him, it’s easy to see how much he cares.

“She won,” Derek says, stepping back to allow a mud-stained Allison to push past into the kitchen. “By twelve seconds.”

Stiles whoops with delight. “One up for team crazy,” he crows, and hands Lydia a mug. “Special celebratory victory coffee,” he says with a grin. “I remembered to bring some cinnamon this time.”

Lydia likes her coffee with as much sugar, cream, cinnamon and, if at all possible, chocolate as she can get away with. Derek says it’s a crime to pollute good coffee that way, Stiles say he just likes black coffee because it’s bitter like his soul (even if he privately agrees).

“Also,” Stiles adds, not sure if he’s overstepping some boundaries, but knowing from the tilt of Lydia’s head that it needs to be said, “Tell Him,” she’ll know who he means, “to fuck off, because you totally won fair and square, and we’re all very impressed.”

For a moment he thinks he’s gone too far, acknowledging her issues out loud like that, but then she smiles at him, wide and genuine and heart-breakingly surprised.

“You’d be such a bad psychiatrist,” Allison says, with a smile in her voice.

For a long time, Stiles hadn’t been sure that the affection between Allison and Lydia was real. Their friendship seems to be founded mainly on being spectacularly bitchy to one another, after all. But once the two of them had started spending time with the supers, Stiles had begun to see how deeply they really cared, and how fiercely loyal they were to one another. It isn’t like any friendship Stiles has ever had, but it’s definitely real.

Derek’s warmth appears behind Stiles and he leans back into it, taking a deep breath of contentment.

“Smells good,” he says softly. The kitchen still smells of burnt wood, but it also smells of the pack, and coffee and cinnamon and Armani aftershave.

“Smells like a home,” Derek agrees, his voice so soft that Stiles barely hears him. That’s pretty much the moment Stiles decides that, no matter how hard it is or how long it takes, he’s getting everyone to join Derek’s pack.

“Who wants to play Trivial Pursuit?” he asks after a moment. Pack bonding is important.

“I came to talk about Jackson,” Danny says, but Stiles thinks he sounds tempted.

“Plotting first, board games after,” Lydia says, with a grin. She likes games where she always wins.

“Danny?” Stiles can feel Derek turning to look at the human.

“He’s not doing so well,” Danny says. “He won’t really talk to me, but I think he’s having blackouts. He was visiting me the other day, and it was like he wasn’t there. But then he suddenly wakes up and it’s like… like he wasn’t even Jackson. He wanted to cuddle, and he promised me that he wouldn’t be angry with me for it, and I think he meant it. And when he realised I was a bit bruised from Lacross he freaked out. Like, blood-thirsty rage kinda thing. Only when I told him to calm down, he did. Then a couple of minutes later, he was himself again. Like, instantly. One minute cuddly memory loss Jackson, next minute angry embarrassed Jackson who couldn’t get out of my house fast enough and who hasn’t spoken to me since.”

“That sounds pretty terrifying,” Stiles said, his voice carefully blank.

“If I’d been there….” Lydia said, frowning. “If I could be near him when he has one of these black-outs, maybe we could learn a bit more about them.”

“That’s a good idea,” Boyd says, “But it’d probably be pretty hard to organise.”

“Anything else?” Derek demands.

“Well he didn’t go to swim practise this week, and when I asked him about it, he just shook his head and said that he ‘couldn’t’ and wouldn’t talk about it.”

“Physical changes maybe,” Erica suggests. “Something he doesn’t want people seeing.”

“Scales,” Stiles guesses. “Or some kind of chitinous shell.” Thank you, Morrowind, for teaching him the meaning of the word chitinous.

The others turned to look at him. “Well there’s basically no toxic mamals,” Stiles pointed out. “And I think we can rule out the idea that he’s turning into some kind of plant. So that means reptile or insect. Reptile seems more likely.”

“We don’t actually know that he is poisonous,” Scott points out. “Just that he smells that way to you. He doesn’t smell especially bad to me. More just… nothingy. A kind of scent black hole.”

But your body isn’t weighing him up as a potential meal, Stiles thinks. He doesn’t say it out loud. However true it might be, it still sounds weird.

“This would be so much easier,” Lydia says, “If Jackson knew what was happening to him. We could just ask him questions and know if he was lying.”

“You still think he doesn’t?” Danny asks, sounding worried.

Lydia shakes her head. “I’m certain. He wouldn’t be so scared if he did. Worried maybe, but he’s terrified that way people only are when they don’t know what’s happening to them. His imagination is offering him all the worst case scenarios.”

“And probably none of them are as bad at the truth,” Isaac said, sounding unnaturally cheery as he does. Stiles loves Isaac – it’s pretty much impossible _not_ to love Isaac – but he thinks sometimes that the years of abuse have broken something in Isaac’s mind.

Danny blinks like he’s trying to hold back tears. “I’m so scared,” he whispers. “You’ve got to help him. You’ve got too.”


	5. Chapter 5

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So you'll be excited (or maybe not) to learn that I actually have a plot for this now! Admittedly my plot outline is actually just a beginning and an end with 'and then something happens' in the middle, but it's a start.
> 
> I realised writing this that I didn't really make it clear where this is set. This series is basically an alternative season 2, so all the stuff with Peter and Kate happened, but not Lydia's running around naked in the woods. I hope that clears some stuff up.
> 
> More Derek next chapter. He's been kinda left out so far in this fic.

Crouching in the bushes outside Jackson’s house is not where Lydia would have chosen to spend her Saturday evening. The lawn under his bedroom window is steeply sloping, and it’s only Stiles’ hand, warm and reassuring against her back, that’s keeping her from toppling over.

The precariousness of her position isn’t helping her concentration, though it’s not as distracting as the pinch of denim against the backs of her knees (this is why she always wears skirts, she reminds herself), the constant buzz of Stiles’ mind or, worst of all, her fucking hallucination singing show-tunes at her. He can’t sing.

“Please not Carousel,” she mutters, when he launches into an out of tune rendition of ‘You’ll never walk alone’. “I like Carousel.” It had been her grandma’s favourite film.

Stiles uses his free hand to flip the bird to the darkness. He aims it in entirely the wrong direction, but she appreciates the thought. There’s something very soothing about the way Stiles treats her hallucination like a real, albeit invisible, person.

Sick of feeling so unsteady, Lydia scrambles round so that she’s lying on her back, staring up at the stars. It’s not like she actually needs to see the house for her powers to work.

She can feel the Whitmores inside, fuzzy little sparks of consciousness in her mind, but she’s not going to try and get a proper reading from Jackson until he’s alone. All she can ever sense from him when he’s with his parents is an unpleasantly prickly combination of guilt and discomfort.

“Is there anything I can do?” Stiles asks softly. “You know, to make my mind less distracting?”

She shakes her head, then realises that it’s dark and whispers, “No, it’s just the way your brain is. I’m getting better at filtering it out.”

Every mind is different, has its own shape and feel, and mental illnesses, or any kind of disorder that affects the brain’s functioning, aren’t passing blips like emotions or thoughts. They become part of the inherent feel of the mind. Stiles’ ADHD is like static on a radio, making it hard to hear what’s going on, everything slightly distorted. Derek’s PTSD (which they all carefully avoid mentioning) is like that horrible hotcold feeling she gets just before being sick, an edge of discomfort underlying everything. Allison’s occasional bouts of depression feel like black slime, covering and infecting every other thought. The feeling of their minds can be horrible, but they can no more change it than they can cure themselves, so she keeps quiet about it.

“I’d be able to concentrate better on my own,” she offers.

“No,” he says firmly. “I’m not letting you do this alone.”

Stiles is protective of the pack and it’s hangers-on, more so even than their Alpha, but since she’d given in to his nagging and explained the tracery of pale scars that covered her knuckles, he’s barely let her out of his sight. She’s pretty sure it’s only propriety and his need to actually eat sometimes that keeps him from camping outside her bedroom window to try and protect her from the monsters in her own head.

“How’s project cheer up Derek going?” she asks, to distract him, and to give herself something to listen too other than her mind’s half remembered version of Oklahoma.

“Oh, you know, not bad,” Stiles whispers back, and she can hear in his voice that he’s blushing. “I shifted in my sleep again last week and he didn’t freak out at all. Recognised me straight away. Although I don’t know if that’s him getting less paranoid, or the fact that I always smell of his blood now, whatever shape I’m in.”

“That’s almost romantic, except for the bit where it’s really really sick,” she comments.

Stiles huffs with fond annoyance. “When you finally get a super of your own, prepare yourself from some major teasing,” he hisses. “It’s time you got a taste of your own medicine.”  
“What makes you think I’m going to get a Super?” she demands, carefully ignoring the little voice at the back of her mind pointing out that she wants one.

“I might not say anything about it,” Stiles says with a grin, “But that doesn’t mean I don’t notice how you and Danny smell around Jackson. Peuchen don’t see with their noses like werewolves, but sex and blood we’re good at noticing.”

She’s saved from having to respond straight away by Stiles giving a kind of all body twitch and muttering, “Sorry, I gotta…” A moment later, he’s female.

“You okay?” she whispers, because she’s one of the few people he’s completely comfortable shifting in front of, but that hadn’t look voluntary.

“Fine,” Stiles whispers back, and as always it suprises her that his voice is different, even though she can see him silhouetted against the light from the house, still slender but with curves now. “Sometimes I just… Sometimes the body I’m in just feels wrong.”

This is a much safer topic than her feelings for Jackson, so she whispers back, “Want to talk about it?”

Stiles shrugs. “To begin with, shifting was just something I did when I needed too. I mean, I was definitely still male. This body was a disguise. Now though, I think… I think I’m starting to think like a Peuchen. I don’t think of myself as male or female. I’m both. Neither. And sometimes I just… need to be in a different body. I think part of it might be the ADHD. I’ve always felt the need to get out of my own skin, not I have the option.”

Lydia looks down at the tracery of scars on her knuckles, invisible in the darkness but clear in her mind’s eye, and sighs. She likes her body, but being able to be someone else for a few hours sounds nice. Except, of course, that Stiles isn’t anyone else. He’s just Stiles with boobs.

“He’s a boy with a cunt,” a voice behind her says, “And he’s still less of a freak than you.”

She really hates being crazy sometimes.

“If we solve whatever’s up with Jackson,” Stiles muses, “Do you think Danny’ll finally tell him how he feels?”

Lydia’s heart clenches. She knows, has known for years, how Danny feels about Jackson. Everyone with half a brain does. She thinks though that she might be the only one who knows that Jackson returns the feelings. It was one of the few things, back before werewolves and hallucinations, that ever made her feel really insecure, because the fierceness of Jackson’s love for Danny is almost suffocating. Some nights it was only the knowledge that Jackson didn’t know how he felt that kept her from running from it.

“Probably,” she whispers back. “He’s so scared for him.” Maybe if she tells herself often enough that she’s not jealous, it’ll become true.

“I have no idea how that would work,” Stiles says. “I mean, a three-way relationship is one thing, but one where two of the participants don’t fancy each other? Sound complicated to me.”

“Stiles, what are you talking about?” she hisses.

“Well you love Jackson, and Danny loves Jackson, and Jackson loves both of you, and making him choose would be kinda fucked up, so I just sort of assumed you’d share,” Stiles explains, like that’s not entirely insane.

“Less fucked up than me and Danny sharing him,” Lydia hisses back. “That’s seriously mental Stiles.”

She can see the ‘well you would know’ hovering on Stiles’ lips, but before she can pre-emptively hit him, something itches in her subconscious, some new mind that wasn’t there a moment ago, and Stiles spins around, staring into the dark.

“Who’s there?” Stiles whispers, before Lydia can stop him.

Her straining ears catch something in the dark that could be soft laughter. She’s aware now of a mind, fuzzy and indistinct the way strangers always are, but definitely not friendly.

“Waterloo,” she whispers to Stiles, their code for ‘someone’s about to attack us and I think it’s safer if I don’t say that out loud’.

She can’t see him clearly, but she sees the movement as he nods. “Get behind me,” he murmurs to her, shifting back to male as he stands. He’s not much taller male, but those two inches could give him an advantage.

She ducks behind him, feeling a little bad even as she does it. She knows it’s only practical – he can heal far faster than her, and he’s got a killer instinct she lacks - but it still feels like she’s putting him in danger.

“You’re not scared are you?” her hallucination demands. “A big girl like you?”

Normally she’d argue, or swear at him, but this time she bites her lip, not wanting to say anything the stranger in the darkness might hear.

Stiles grabs her hand. “Come on,” he whispers. “Away from the house.”

Away from the humans, he doesn’t need to say.

They stumble down the steeply banked lawn, feet sliding on the slightly damp grass, leaning on one another for support. Her hallucination is humming the Mission Impossible theme tune.

The stranger, mind a confusing jumble of fear and amusement and desire to hurt, is coming closer.

“Alright,” Stiles says firmly into the night. “We know you’re there. I can smell you. Pretty sure even the humans can smell you.”

A figure emerges from the shadows of Mr Whitmore’s SUV. It’s a woman, probably middle aged, though the darkness makes it hard to tell, and, from her clothes and the smell that Lydia’s really wishing Stiles hadn’t drawn her attention to, homeless.

“What do you want?” Stiles demands, though his voice is a little softer now. He’s feeling sorry for the woman, Lydia can tell, which she thinks is pretty stupid. But then she can feel the disturbing jumble of the woman’s emotions. All Stiles can sense is that the woman is poor and homeless.

“You smell of wolves,” the woman says, and her voice is a high nasal whine.

“So do you,” Stiles replies.

“You smell of lots of wolves,” the woman responds, shuffling a little closer. “You smell of a pack.”

Stiles and Lydia remain silent.

“I heard Beacon Hills had a new Alpha. Young. Doesn’t know what he’s doing yet. He’ll be wanting strong fighters, if he’s going to hold his territory.”

“No offence, but I’m pretty sure you’re not what Derek’s looking for. I don’t even think he’s looking for anyone. The pack he’s got is enough of a handful.”

The woman makes a strange little snarling sound that Lydia thinks might be a chuckle. “I’m exactly what he needs, little vampire. I just need to prove it too him.”

Lydia feels the attack before it comes, feels the coalescing of the anger and fear into purpose, but she doesn’t have a chance to cry out. Stiles shoves her backwards, making her stumble, and takes the swipe across the face.

She sees blood, dark against the pale oval of Stiles’ face, then Stiles launches himself forward, grabbing for the woman. He catches her arm, twists it until Lydia hears the sick cracking sound she’s learnt to recognise as breaking bone.

The woman shakes her hand free, her arm hanging at an odd angle, and tries to pin Stiles against Mr Whitmore’s car. Stiles shifts as she pushes at him, his smaller shape slipping easily out of her grip, but his back hits the car before he gets away.

The wail of the alarm splits the air, a deafening screech that makes their attack clap her hands over her ears. She snarls at them and disappears back out into the darkness.  
Stiles grabs Lydia’s hand, his fingers slick with sweat and blood. 

“Come on,” he whispers. “The last thing we need is to be caught vandalising cars.”

They run to where Stiles’s jeep is parked, just out of site of the house, feet sliding as the gravel skids beneath their feet.

They don’t speak again until they’re back in town. Stiles pulls up on the side of Main Street and rests his head against his seat and pants. There’s a smear of blood on his cheek, but the wound it had come from has healed.

“Okay,” Stiles says. “So I’m pretty sure that was an Omega.

“I’m going to take you home now, and you’re going to do everything you can to secure your house, and then I’m going to go and tell Derek what happened.” He groans. “We could really have done without this right now.”


	6. Chapter 6

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> So this is kind of a filler chapter, while I finally clean up Feels Good. Enjoy. Normal service will be resumed as soon as my muse gets her arse in gear and I find the piece of paper I wrote the plot on.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Warnings for mentions of self-harm. It's pretty light and plot-related, but be careful.

Even by the standards of his friendship group, some of the things Stiles knows about Derek are pretty fucking weird. He knows that blood from Derek’s chest tastes sweeter than the blood from his thighs. He knows that Derek fucking giggles if you cut the backs of his knees (weirdest sex-related moment of his life so far, hands down). He knows that if he touches Derek’s hair during sex, Derek will freeze and refuse to look at him.

If he didn’t like Allison so much, Stiles would dig up Kate Argent’s body and set fire to it. And dance around the pyre singing some kind of celebratory song. Bitch was a complete psycho.

He also knows, is being reminded pretty forcefully right now, that Derek really doesn’t like it when he gets hurt.

“I’m fine,” he tells Derek, like if he says in enough maybe Derek will believe him. He won’t, Stiles has a summer’s worth of experience telling him he won’t, that Derek will only be satisfied once he’s inspected every inch of Stiles’ body for injuries and made him smell like Derek again, but he think he ought to at least try. They might not be human, but that doesn’t mean they have to act like animals.

Stiles is tolerating Derek’s inspection with only minor grumbling until Derek starts trying to rip his clothes off him.

Stiles catches his wrists, holds them firmly still. “Seriously,” he tells him, trying to keep his voice as calm as he can, “I’m absolutely fine. There’s no need for shredding my clothes. I _like_ this shirt. If you want me to strip so you can rub your face all over me, you only have to ask.”

Stiles is still a little freaked out that his life contains sentences like that. On the other hand it also contains a topless Derek Hale (the dude is seriously allergic to shirts – Stiles is beginning to think it’s a symptom of werewolfism, though if it is, Erica is thus far disappointingly immune) who wants to rub himself all over Stiles’ naked body. If he actually lets himself think stuff like ‘scent marking’ it feels kinda creepy, but so long as he just lies there and doesn’t think about it, it’s awesome.

Derek makes a little grumbling noise in the back of his throat, but he stops trying to shred Stiles’ jeans, so Stiles counts that as a win. With Derek, you have to learn to appreciate the little victories.

Stiles shuffles out from underneath Derek’s warm weight just enough to strip off his shirt, then lies back and runs his fingers through Derek’s hair.

“If you weren’t so terrifying, the big hair and leather combo would be totally camp,” he tells Derek, and grins at the tiny growl of annoyance he gets in return.

Despite the impression Stiles had initially formed, Derek does in fact know a large number of words, and is fully prepared to use them, but he’s not good at articulating emotions. ‘Stiles there’s no way you can take on that monster by yourself you idiot’ is a totally viable Derek Hale sentence. ‘Stiles I worry about you and I don’t want you to get hurt’ is not. So at times like these when he can’t push his emotions away, Derek tends to go non-verbal.

Derek presses his face against the spot where Stiles’ neck joins his shoulder and makes the little snuffling noise that Stiles’ is convinced is the cutest thing ever.

He grins and lies back, fold his arms under his head. “Go on then,” he says, all fake resignation.

Derek rubs himself sinuously against Stiles, his skin silken soft, and Stiles marvels, like he always does, that someone so solid can go so utterly boneless.

“The omega,” he says, because he hasn’t properly explained yet and he needs to get the information out before Derek melts his brain completely, “I think she wants to join your pack. I mean, I think she though if she beat me, you’d think she was worthy, or something.”

“Sounds likely,” Derek murmurs against Stiles’ chest. “It’s the way a lot of the newer packs operate, the ones that feel they need to prove themselves.”

“You think she’ll keep trying?” Stiles is pretty sure he should be worried, but Derek’s nibbling his collar bone, tiny sucking bites that are turning his spine liquid.

“If she hurts you, we’ll kill her,” Derek says, his voice soft despite the hard words. “Now stop talking and let me lick you.”

Stiles totally isn’t going to argue with that.

**oOOOo**

Stiles had told her to stay home, that she’d be safe there, but Lydia doesn’t feel safe. She feels like there are monsters in every shadow. She feels shaken like she hasn’t since she watched the pack fight off attackers at the beginning of the summer. She feels like she had when she’d first woken up in the hospital, the barely healed bite making every movement agony, and the half-remembered face of her attacker staring down at her with a smug grin.

She doesn’t think being alone is a very good idea right now - once she’d like being alone, preferred it even, but that was before she had scars that will never quite fade and the memory of a man she knows to be dead taunting her - so she calls Allison.

Allison says she’s stuck at home (‘Hunter business, I don’t think I can slip away’), so Lydia drives herself over to the Argent’s house.

Lydia’s waiting for her on the step, wrapped in an oversized sweater that Lydia thinks might be stolen from Scott. She doesn’t greet her, or ask what’s going on, just gathers her friend into a tight hug, lets Lydia hide her face against the soft wool.

Allison knows enough about fear and trauma and private grief that she doesn’t say anything, doesn’t try to pretend that it’s all going to be okay, or whisper soothing platitudes. She just stands, strong and immovable, running long fingers through Lydia’s hair.

She’s known Allison less than a year, but her mind is as familiar to Lydia as her own, and listening to the quiet background hum of it is more soothing than words could ever be. She’s alive, and her best friend is alive, and there’d been a time when that had seemed impossible, so she’s doing pretty well.

“Me and Stiles were attacked,” she says, when she’s feeling calm enough to explain. “Rouge omega we think.”

“You okay?” Other people would panic, check for wounds, but Allison’s cool head is one of the things Lydia loves most about her.

“Fine. She ran off when she set off a car alarm. Stiles got a few scratches, but they’ll be all healed by now. I’m just a bit freaked.”

“You want the hunters to know?”

Lydia shrugs. “Your dad maybe. I think Derek can run her off without help, but it wouldn’t hurt if he knew, and he won’t interfere.”

Chris knows more than he’ll ever admit to the other hunters about the Beacon Hills pack and their various hangers on, and he’s never done anything to hurt them yet. Lydia doesn’t like him much, his mind is full of confusion and guilt, but she trusts him to do the right thing.

“Come on,” Allison says, taking her hand. “Gerard and the others are…”

“In the basement, plotting,” Lydia says with a smile, because it will never not be novel that she can say things like that and be believed.

Allison grins. “Show off.”

**oOOOo**

The sound of a car’s wheels crunching on the gravel outside may be the most beautiful sound Christ has heard all week. As head of the household, naturally it’s his duty to slip away, from this room full of his father’s disciples, to see who it is.

Only Victoria sees him leave, catches his eye and gives him a small frown of disapproval. She’s still a believer, still loyal to the clan in a way Chris hasn’t been since Kate died, maybe even before, but she doesn’t rat him out, just looks a little disappointed as she watches him go.

Their visitor is Lydia. She smiles at him when she sees him, looking sweet and pretty as ever, despite the tears drying on her cheeks.

“Hello Mr Argent,” she says, and smiles at him. “I do home I’m not disturbing you?”

There’s a hint of flirtation in her tone, the one that’s always there, not enough to make him uncomfortable, because she’s young enough to be his daughter and he’s decidedly not interested, but enough to make him preen a little. He doesn’t want teenage girls lusting after him, but it’s nice to know they at least notice him.

Victoria says he’s turning into a silver fox. He laughs and says she hasn’t aged a day. It’s a lie, so blatant it almost doesn’t count, and anyway, he likes all the ways she’s aged, likes the softness to her belly that shows she’d carried their child, the subtle lines on her face that tell of laughter and tears and fear and joy and all the things which make life life.

“We need to talk to you,” Allison says, biting her lip the way she always does when she’s nervous. “It’s about the pack.”

He’s resigning himself to the idea that his daughter may, it hasn’t happened yet but it’s looking increasingly inevitable, join a wolf pack. It wouldn’t, despite Gerard’s insistence to the contrary, be the first time. Wolves and hunters live together outside human society. It’s only natural that sometimes they grow a little too close.

He doesn’t like the idea, but he’s prepared for it. He’s prepared to deal with it. He doesn’t think Vicki is.

“This is for your ears only,” Lydia says severely. “We don’t want it reaching any of the more… volatile hunters. Those that don’t know when to leave well alone.”

He nods, manages not to smile at the note of warning in her voice.

“Me and Stiles were attacked earlier tonight.”

“Are you okay?”

“Oh fine, Stiles dealt with it.” He doesn’t know the kid well, but the name conjures images of big bambi eyes and limbs as long and out of control as a colts. Not someone he can picture winning a fight.

“They think is was an omega,” Allison says. “Stiles is telling Derek, and the pack will deal with it, but we thought…”

“We thought it wouldn’t hurt if someone else knew,” Lydia says.

Chris does smile then, because once again he’s genuinely impressed by these kids. He thinks of them as little more than children, but that isn’t fair to them. They’re eminently sensible, have even defeated his father in battle. They’re hardly little kids.

“I won’t interfere,” he tells them. “Unless they hurt a human, omegas are pack business. Are you sure you and Stiles are okay though?” He knows they both tough kids, but it’s not like either of them are werewolves.

“Stiles got a bit hurt, but he heals fast,” Lydia says with a smile. “He didn’t let the omega touch me.”

Chris wonders vaguely why Allison didn’t date this Stiles kid instead, all the chivalry with added humanity, but then he pictures again the big eyes and full lips. A good looking kid, but not the sort teenage girls fall in love with. From what he remembers of High School, they prefer the jocks. Although most of his high school memories consist of his father searching his and Kate’s bags for knives and cross-bows before they left every morning. He’s glad Allison’s able to have a happier time, even if it does mean dating werewolves.

**oOOOo**

Jackson is pretty sure he heard a fight outside earlier. His dad’s car alarm had started up and there’d been scuffling and raised voices. He’s pretty sure he should care about that.

His head hurts. It’s been two days since it last didn’t hurt.

He has this feeling, vague and itching under his skin, that something’s wrong. That his body’s wrong. Yesterday he’d cut a thin line into his arm, because that’s what teenagers whose bodies feel wrong do, and then watched with detached curiosity as it bled sluggishly. After a few minutes he had become aware that it hurt, so he licked it. His spit had sealed the wound, left it knitted together with something clear and hard like dried glue. He knows that’s not normal.

He wants, desperately, for someone else to take control for a bit. He doesn’t know what he should be doing, how things are supposed to work. It would all be easier if someone else were in charge.

He keeps starting messages to Danny, gets as far as brining up his number, but he always stops himself before he presses send. There’s no way to make ‘I don’t know what to do’ sound like anything other than it is – desperate and pathetic, a poor attempt at fishing for company and sympathy.

He hasn’t eaten for four days. His skin looks like paper, white and fragile. Last night he dreamt about peeling it off. It had felt good. Cathartic. Underneath he wasn’t raw and pink, but a mottled green, scales as tough as Kevlar, strong and protected.

He’s stopped dreaming of flying, but not of killing. His dreams are full of blood now. Of retribution.

He’d climbed into his room in one dream, prehensile tail and long claws making scaling the wall easy, huge wings flaring out to balance him, and seen himself, lying in bed. He’d killed him, slit his throat. It had felt good.

He thinks he might be going mad. He wishes Danny were with him.

He fell over in Lacross practise. He hadn’t said anything when the others laughed. He couldn’t tell them that he was trying to balance for the weight of wings and a tail. That he’d expected claws to catch the earth when he turned, anchoring him. Danny had looked scared and it made Jackson hate himself a little bit more.

**Author's Note:**

> Anyone with tumblr, come be my friend at lentilswitheverything or find my multi-fandom fic recs at gluttonforpunishment
> 
> If you spot any glaring Britishisms, let me know.


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